Meditations

Meditations by Mark — Mark’s comments on CLP Sunday School lessons. Read them for personal encouragement and challenge as well as for preparation for Sunday School class or some other study of the Scripture passages.

Please feel free to use the comments to add your own perspectives and questions.

Be as the Bereans of old — study the Scriptures to be sure these things are so. And if you find something amiss or unbiblical, please let me know — I do not want to be in error!

Oh, and you can find more of these archived at my Anabaptists site. For more than a decade, I wrote a page called “Applications for Youth” in the Sunday School quarterly for youth produced by Christian Light Publications. I have most of them online at Thoughts for the Week.

Job’s Desire to Speak With God

Job was confident!

Job 23

Job had no interest in avoiding God, but he didn’t seem to know anymore where to find Him (Job 23:3). Wherever he looked, he simply could not see God (Job 23:8,9).

Job was confident of the rightness of his cause and the righteousness of his life. He would gladly lay out his case before God (Job 23:4).

He was also confident He could follow God’s line of reasoning, if he could only know it (Job 23:5).

And he was confident the Almighty would put His strength toward Job’s good. He believed the Almighty’s strength would become his own source of strength (Job 23:6).

Job was confident God knew about him and what was going on, even if Job didn’t know where God was nor what He was up to (Job 23:10). He was confident good would come from this test. He believed God would refine him, not destroy him. Read it all

Powerful Prayer

The effective prayer of the righteous can do a lot.

James 5:13-18

Prayer is as a solid rope, not as a wispy vapor.

Pray when you’re afflicted (James 5:13). The Greek term translated is afflicted here is used only three other times in the New Testament. Notice how its use in those contexts seems to restrict the meaning:

endure hardness (2 Timothy 2:3)
suffer trouble (2 Timothy 2:9)
endure afflictions (2 Timothy 4:5)

Why pray during affliction?

deliverance and glory (Psalm 50:15)
divine answers, presence, deliverance, and honor (Psalm 91:15)

Notice this connection between affliction, prayer, and humility: “And when he was in affliction, he besought the LORD his God, and humbled himself greatly before the God of his fathers” (2 Chronicles 33:12). Read it all

I Know That My Redeemer Lives

Despite physical decay, Job expected to see God with his own eyes.

Job 19:5-10, 14-27

Even at that stage in history, with the promised Redeemer still hundreds of years from manifesting Himself in the flesh, Job said in simple faith: “I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth” (Job 19:25).

Reminds me of Enoch’s prophecy: “Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints” (Jude 14).

Our Redeemer, the One who was dead, is alive and will come again! While He awaits that grand event, He continues His redeeming, renewing, restoring, reviving work in our hearts so that we are ready to receive Him. “To the end he may stablish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints” (1 Thessalonians 3:13). Read it all

Jesus’ Intercession for Us

The access He gives us to God is eternal.

Hebrews 4:14-5:10

Our Intercessor is there at the Father’s right hand.

He intercedes for His own on the basis of His sacrifice and their obedience.

He offers continual intercession for us (Romans 8:34).

Our Redeemer Priest is consecrated for eternity; therefore, the access He gives us to God is likewise eternal.

Jesus’ work makes His people perfect before Him because He rose for our justification (Romans 4:25). His work produces genuine cleansing and righteousness.

God requires obedience of His people, for Jesus is “the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him” (Hebrews 5:9). Those who do not obey Him have no business calling Him Lord (Luke 6:46). Read it all

Man Dies — Shall He Live Again?

Yet through the scent of water it will...

Job 14:1-15

Sometimes life seems so short, pointless, and hopeless. Other times, it seems full, thriving, and bright.

Eventually, all life ends.

Is there hope for life after that?

Yes!

Because the Redeemer lives, “in my flesh shall I see God” (Job 19:26).

Jesus said, “Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice” (John 5:28).

But that’s then. What about now?

“Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not” (Jeremiah 33:3). Read it all